- Which of the models traveled the fastest? Explain why you think one of the models had the fastest speed.
- What effect did ship weight and ship design have on ship speed?
- Does ship speed increase constantly as the powering force increases? Explain the reasoning for your answer.
- As ship speed increases, how is the size of waves (wake) affected? What is your evidence?
- Examine ship speed
- At what speed does each ship travel most efficiently?
- If you were building a small electric motor for each ship, what propulsion force would you have the motor exert to be the most fuel-efficient?
- What do you think of the following statement: Traveling at fuel-efficient speed is not always desirable in real situations.
The formula for work energy is:

- Make a graph similar to that in Fig. 8.56 displaying speed (cm/sec) vertically and energy (gf x cm) horizontally. Compare this graph with the graph in Fig. 8.58. Explain the differences and similarities between the graphs.
- Hypothesize whether there is a maximum speed that one of the ships could go. If so, what do you think it is? How did you arrive at this speed? How could you test your hypothesis?
- Compare the efficient hull speed of the ships. What relationship, if any, is there between
- efficient hull speed and hull length?
- efficient hull speed and hull shape?
- Imagine that you are a ship or boat builder. Design an advertisement describing one of your ships. Use as many of the following terms as possible:
- design
- fuel efficiency
- speed (maximum speed)
- type of work or use
- stability
- cargo capacity (tonnage)
- powering force
- ship weight
- ship displacement
- length
- width (beam)
- price
- Variability is the amount of difference between the values in the data that you’ve collected. Was there high variability in your recorded wake heights? What about variability between your recorded measurements and a classmate’s measurements?